Payments and Statements

Record money received once, then allocate it to one or more open invoices so customer balances stay correct.

Record a customer payment

1. Go to Sales > Payments and select Record Payment.
2. Select the customer and enter the payment amount, payment date, received date, method and bank details or reference available to you.
3. Leave Status as Completed when the money was received; use Pending only when the receipt is not yet confirmed. Save the payment.
4. Open it and select Allocate / Adjust. Apply amounts to one or more open invoices without exceeding the payment's unallocated amount.
5. Confirm the allocation. Fully covered invoices become paid; partial allocations reduce the outstanding balance.

When the payment does not cover the invoice

A customer settles early and takes a small reduction, or simply pays a bit less than the invoice. The allocation screen tells you what the invoice is short by and gives you the three honest answers, so the leftover is dealt with on purpose rather than left to age.

The panel appears as soon as you open Allocate / Adjust if the amounts being applied do not cover an invoice. You do not have to create the gap by hand first.

Grant a settlement discount

1. On Sales > Payments, open the payment and choose Allocate / Adjust.
2. Allocate what actually arrived. The shortfall panel appears above the invoice table with the difference worked out.
3. Select Discount on the invoice concerned. Enter the amount including VAT — the figure you are letting the customer off, so R50 on an R1,150 invoice they paid R1,100 against.
4. Check the split. It shows what comes off your income, how much VAT you reclaim, and on a mixed invoice how the discount falls across the lines.
5. Add a reason if you want one on the credit note, then choose Add to this payment. The row now reads *will be credited when you save*.
6. Press the save button. It reads Save and Grant Discount while a discount is waiting, and that is what applies the money and issues the credit note, together.

A customer who takes a discount on every invoice

Larger customers often pay a batch of invoices at once and take an agreed settlement discount off each one. Every invoice they pay is then short by its own discount, and each one needs its own credit note. You do them all in one save.

1. Open the payment and choose Allocate / Adjust, or record it on Record Payment and allocate it there.
2. Make sure every invoice on the customer's remittance advice has an amount against it, and no others do.
3. Type the percentage into Paid less a discount, for example 2.5, and choose Apply to these invoices. Each invoice is set to what the customer paid and given a discount for the rest, worked out on the invoice total.
4. Check the amounts against the remittance advice. If the customer paid a different figure on one invoice, type it in and choose Discount on that row instead.
5. Press Save and Grant once. One credit note is issued per invoice.

If you have already typed what was paid on each invoice, Discount all in the shortfall panel discounts every shortfall in one click. After saving, the payment shows each invoice with its Discount and what is Still owing.

A receipt you have already allocated still offers this, on the invoice it left short. The panel says how much of that receipt is on the invoice and what is still owing. There is nothing left to allocate in that case, so the button reads Grant Discount and the discount is all that gets saved.

A settlement discount can also be granted later from the invoice itself: open it and use Grant Settlement Discount in Quick Actions. Both routes need a company administrator. See Credits and corrections for what the credit note does to your books.

Record a payment on a foreign-currency invoice

A customer billed in dollars pays you in rand, and the amount that lands is never the amount on the invoice: the bank converts at its own rate and takes a fee. OxyAccounting asks for both facts rather than guessing at either.

1. Enter what the payment clears in the customer's currency, and allocate it to their open invoices as usual.
2. Enter what actually arrived in your rand account, straight off your bank statement.
3. Enter Fees charged by your bank and Fees charged by an overseas provider where you know them. Leave them at zero if you do not.
4. Save. The invoice clears at the rate it was raised at, the fees are posted as bank charges, and whatever is left over is posted as an exchange gain or loss.

The summary also shows the rate you effectively received against the rate on the invoice, and what the difference cost you as a percentage. That figure is worth reading before you choose how to get paid next time.

A foreign payment has to be allocated before it can reach the ledger, because the rate it clears at comes from the invoices it settles. Until you allocate it, it waits on the Unposted Documents screen and says so.

Unallocated money

A payment can exist before you know which invoice it settles. Its unallocated amount remains visible and can be allocated later. Amount converted to customer credit is also tracked separately. A payment cannot be reduced below the amount already allocated or converted to credit.

Refund a customer who paid too much

Record the full amount the customer actually paid and allocate it to their invoice. The extra is kept on their account as credit. If you then give that money back, record it as a refund so the credit is cleared and your bank balance agrees with your statement.

1. Open the customer. Under the In credit figure, choose Refund to customer.
2. Pick what the refund is paid out of: the credit on their account, or money on a payment that was never allocated to an invoice.
3. Enter the amount, the date you paid it, how you paid it and the bank account it left, then choose Record refund.

If the refund went out by EFT and is on your bank statement, record it from the statement instead: in Bank Reconciliation, on the money-out line, choose Add Transaction and then Customer Refund. That records the refund and matches it to the line in one step. A refund you recorded on the customer's page first is matched automatically when the statement is imported.

The refund appears on the customer's statement as Refund paid to you and in their activity list. To undo one recorded by mistake, use Delete on its row in the customer's activity, which puts the money back on their account as credit. A refund recorded from a bank line is undone by unmatching that line. While any of a payment's credit has been refunded, the payment cannot be cancelled or deleted until the refund is removed. Refunds are for money held in rand; credit held in a foreign currency cannot be refunded yet.

Change an allocation

Open the payment and choose Allocate / Adjust. What the receipt already settles is listed under Current Allocations, with a Remove button on each line. Removing one recalculates the affected invoice straight away, so an invoice that showed as paid may go back to part-paid, unpaid or overdue.

Amounts are taken as you type them. A figure larger than the invoice owes is not quietly trimmed: the row says so and Save refuses until it is put right.

Correct a payment recorded incorrectly

A receipt captured for the wrong amount, on the wrong date or against the wrong customer is corrected in place rather than deleted. The order matters, because a payment cannot be reduced below what it has already committed.

1. Open the payment and choose Allocate / Adjust. Remove every allocation that is wrong, and any that stand in the way of the corrected amount.
2. Return to the payment and choose Edit. Correct the amount, date, customer, method or bank details, then save.
3. Choose Allocate / Adjust again and apply the corrected receipt to the right invoices.

If the amount you enter is below what the payment already settles, the edit is refused and the figure you would have to free up first is named. Remove the allocations, or the customer credit it was converted to, and try again.

Changing the amount, date, customer or the rand that reached your bank rewrites the payment's accounting entry to match. Changing a reference or a note leaves the ledger alone.

Delete an incorrect payment

Open the payment and use Delete. Confirm only when the real receipt should not exist in OxyAccounting. The payment, allocations and ledger effect are reversed together. A locked accounting period can prevent the reversal.

Send a statement

1. Go to Reports > Customer Statements.
2. Select the customer, start date and end date, then choose Generate Statement.
3. Review the transaction history, the unpaid invoices, the customer summary and the age analysis.
4. Choose Download PDF, or Email Statement to send it.
5. Check the Send to address. It is filled from the customer's record and can be changed, so a customer with no email address on file can still be sent one.
6. Add a message if you want one, tick Send me a copy to be copied in, then choose Send Statement.

The email goes out in your company's name with the statement attached as a PDF, and replies come to your company email address. Your message appears after the greeting. Statements sent on the right lists the last five statements emailed to that customer. Bounced means the customer's mail server rejected it, so check the address and send again.

Everything on a statement is measured at its end date. A statement for August sent in September lists the invoices that were unpaid on 31 August and ages them to that date, so the unpaid list, the age analysis and the closing balance always agree. Money on the customer's account is set against their oldest debt first.

The PDF ends with How to pay: your account name, bank and account number, and the customer's own name as the reference to quote. It comes from Settings > Company > Banking, so fill it in once and every statement carries it. Underneath is your own statement message, set at Settings > Company > Documents > Statement Defaults. Use it for how you would rather be paid or what to quote as a reference. Leave either blank and nothing is printed for it.

Send statements to every customer at month-end

1. Go to Reports > Customer Statements and choose Send statements to several customers at once.
2. The page opens on last month. To send a different period, change the dates and choose Show balances.
3. Every customer is listed with their balance at the end of the period and when they were last sent a statement. Everyone who owes you money and has an email address is already ticked.
4. Tick or untick customers as needed. Switch off Only customers with a balance to see everyone, including customers in credit or at nil.
5. Add a message for every customer if you want one, then choose Send and confirm.

Statements go out in the background, one per customer, over the next few minutes. Refresh the page to see each one marked Sent. A problem with one address does not stop the others, and choosing Send twice does not send anyone two copies of the same period.

When the invoice still shows unpaid

• Open the payment and confirm the amount appears under Payment Allocations, not only as unallocated.
• Check that it was allocated to the intended invoice and customer.
• Confirm the allocation total does not stop short because of bank charges or withholding.